The Echo Chamber Or Quiet Desperation?
Mark Evans has a thought-provoking piece on why it is so difficult to come up with “original thoughts” on blogs. It boils down to one of two extremes: you either participate in the cacophony of the echo chamber–which I’m afraid this post does to a certain extent–or write original, thought provoking stuff that not a soul comments on.
At the end of the day, I try and write about things that interest me. Some days, that is participating in the echo chamber. I’ve had readers comment to me in email they’d like to see me do a piece on X, where X is some really cool thing that’s been overwritten about. Some days, it’s because the blog must be fed.
And while some would argue there is no such thing as an original thought, there is such a thing as an original presentation of an idea. As an example Twitter–one of the hot, micro blogging/social networking tools–reminds me of IRC. Same basic idea–broadcast your thoughts to whomever will listen–but a different presentation.
I really try not to look at my blog statistics. Oh sure, I look at themonce in a while to find out how I’m doing, but I try not to obsess over them. I am not in this blogging thing to win friends and influence gobs of people–just the right ones. That means, frequently, I tread the path of quiet desperation.
But then, things happen. Things you don’t expect. Things that make the seemingly quiet desperation worthwhile.
photo credit: buildscharacter
